Shared Google Photos albums get more social with new features

Not only does Google want Google Photos to be the home for all your images, but now the company wants it to be a social hub for sharing them with others. Google recently pushed out a new version of Photos—version 1.20—that brings new social features to the app. Google says anyone who joins a shared album can now add comments to individual photos or the overall group.

New features in Google Photos bring a social dynamic to your shared images.

Additionally, you’ll see “smart suggestions” for which photos to add to an album you’ve joined. If it’s about a birthday party, for example, Google may look for other pictures of the same group that might have been left out.

When sharing an album, you’ll need to turn on the Collaborate and Comment features to let people participate. You’ll see the toggle for these when selecting a group of pictures to share.

All the new goodies are found in the latest build of Google Photos, which is still rolling out on the Play Store (as of Friday) or available now on APK Mirror.

The impact on you: We highly recommend Google Photos if you want to keep your entire photo collection backed up and available for easy sharing. The image recognition capabilities are also top notch, though just keep in mind if you want full sizes of your pictures saved it will eat into your Google Drive storage bank.

The IDG News Service is the world's leading daily source of global IT news, commentary and editorial resources. The News Service distributes content to IDG's more than 300 IT publications in more than 60 countries.